The ore ilmenite contains mostly titanium, iron, and oxygen. In order to remove the titanium, the ore is reacted with chlorine and carbon to produce TiCl.sub.4, FeCl.sub.3 and CO and CO.sub.2. The carbon in the process ties up the oxygen in the ore. The ferric chloride gas is separated from the titanium chloride gas by condensation of the ferric chloride at 315.degree. C. which is its boiling point. The titanium tetrachloride is then converted to TiO.sub.2 which finds wide use in the paint pigment and specialized metals industries. As can be appreciated, this process, which is the basic process for producing titanium products, creates a large amount of ferric chloride by-product. The disclosure of U.S. Pat. No. 4,144,316 discloses a process for taking the chlorine out of ferric chloride. Ferric chloride is a by-product of the process for producing titanium oxide and titanium metals. It is highly desirable to remove the chlorine from the ferric compound and reuse it in the process for producing TiCl.sub.4. However, the processes for doing that have been bogged down with difficulties. First of all, ferric chloride is highly corrosive, making even its disposal difficult. Furthermore, it is highly hygroscopic. Accordingly, the process for recovering Cl.sub.2 gas by burning ferric chloride with oxygen has been beset with many difficulties.
Other problems have been the plug-up and fouling of equipment. In addition, the ferric oxide that is formed by such a process has added to the difficulty by scaling the walls of the reactor.
Accordingly, it is one object of the present invention to produce a simple and effective process for removing chlorine from ferric chloride.
It is another object to produce an economic process for removing chlorine from ferric chloride.
It is still another object of the present invention to produce a process for effectively handling ferric chloride.
These and other objects are accomplished by means of the disclosure hearing below.